Goodnight
by Ch0k-naT
Summary: Cloud couldn't sleep..he needs Tifa, as simple as that


**Ch0kNaT: **Hello everyone!...lol…ohwell, I got this idea and I just couldn't go to sleep unless I right it down. I get nagging like sensations when I don't write things down, but do not worry I have pretty good mental health. Okay, so before I start making an autobiography, I'd like to start this fanfic

It will be set the day before Advent Children starts . So it's after the game but before AC,ne?

Sorry if it sucks. Here goes…

_**Goodnight…**_

_9:00 pm… _

Cloud flipped his phone for the 6th time in the past hour. He was clearly waiting for a message. Getting impatient with the gadget he had in his hand, he walked to the center of the church, while gazing at the stars which could be seen from the roof-whole he created from falling down about two years ago. Yes, the church served as his sanctuary for the past few months. He'd been staying at the flower girl's church since he left _his family_. It wasn't exactly cozy; there were shattered windows, broken wooden chairs, and all sorts of dirt but behind all those imperfections one thing stood out, there, laid a flower bed. It was full of, surprisingly healthy, yellow and white flowers which danced and swayed every time the wind blew. Cloud felt something tug his lips as he remembered how _Aerith _used to say that even in a place like Midgar, there would be a place for flowers. She would say it in the cheeriest tone, Cloud missed that tone, but he knew that no matter how much he tried he couldn't take his deceased friend back.

Aerith, she had been a dear friend to all of them – to him, Tifa, Cid, Barret, Yuffie and the long line goes on – , the whole world seemed to have mourned when she died, but now, that once devastated world is slowly rebuilding and moving on. The same as Cloud, but as he started rising back up a new problem arose.

_Geostigma._

Even a warrior like Cloud Strife was afraid. Not because of death or pain, it was because of the fear of seeing his friends, his family…Tifa, suffer. Our spiky haired blonde was never Mr. Sunshine. No, not Cloud Strife, he was,well, serious about life. Some would call him too serious, but underneath this man was a soft longing heart, a soft longing heart which had already been given to a certain raven haired girl many years ago. To Tifa Lockheart. She was his support system, the only person who'd been there for him from the beginning. Actually, she was the beginning; she was the reason why Cloud was,Cloud. It was her who drove him to be in SOLDIER, it was her who drove him to fight for the world, and it was her who's keeping him alive up to now. She was his everything, of course this was the same for Tifa but our hero was way too dense to realize that. Cloud was never Mr. Sensitive either.

_I'm scared, too scared to give it my all, until you tell me to, Tifa…_

Cloud whispered to himself, still clutching on to his phone. He opened it and looked at it once more with hopeful eyes wishing that her message would appear, but there was nothing but a blank blue screen. From the day that Cloud moved out, Tifa had been trying to reach him, she had tried calling and sending several messages a day, but her secret lover never responded. After the first two weeks of his leaving Tifa had stopped trying to commit the impossible, instead she just sent reminders and notes to Cloud, telling him to remember to eat or to rest or any of those things that _girlfriends _would say. Above all those reminders though, Cloud always awaited the 'goodnight' she sent, he couldn't sleep without it; to him it was like a lullaby. A 'goodnight' from his childhood friend was the only thing that could grant him peace for a day's strenuous work. That message would usually come at around 8:30 pm, about the same she'd clean the bar and send the kids to bed, but tonight seemed to be different, the small piece of Tifa's concern not yet there. And Cloud knew Tifa was never known for being late. NEVER

Cloud snapped himself out of his deep pondering and started walking to the spot where he laid a mattress. The floor creaked with each step as he walked towards his sleeping spot. It was a small spot with a thin red mattress, beside was a box of materia and it was near the flower bed. He slowly lied down and faced the ceiling, the vanilla scent of the flowers from the pink dressed girl's mini garden comforted him, a little bit, but nothing could sooth him the way Tifa did. It felt as if hours passed, he was twisting and turning, he was restless. Why the hell couldn't he sleep without her message? Second after second he felt like being tortured. He grabbed his cell phone and looked at the digital clock once more.

_9:45…Only minutes passed…damn…_

Cloud knew he would not get to sleep, no, not like this. He was going to get that goodnight and he'd make sure that he'd get it, he'd get it every night from now on.

Cloud stood up and strode to fenrir, mounted it and started the engine…he was driving to Seventh Heaven.

------------------

Tifa's past few months had been rough. She wasn't used to Cloud being gone. After the incident with Sephiroth she hadn't spent a day without him. She wasn't used to eating without him or cleaning the house without him helping or taking care of the Marlene and Denzel without him. They were family, he was already adjusting, he was already…smiling.

_Why'd you have to leave?_

This was the question which often rang through the raven haired lady's depressed heart; she was as scared as him. She was also afraid of losing someone she loved. She was also longing for someone.

Tonight Tifa followed her usual drill, cleaning the bar, taking the sugar loaded children to bed, cleaning herself...but she forgot to do one thing…the one thing she loved doing more than anything else: sending a 'Goodnight' to Cloud Strife, her childhood crush or should I say her _Lifehood crush_. She was too weary today; the two kids were asking for Cloud again, she got too exhausted and too pained.

_10:05 pm_

Cloud arrived in front of the doors of Seventh Heaven; he got off his fenrir and made his way to the door as quietly as he possibly could. He pulled out the keys from his pocket and he took and fixed his eyes on the keychain. It was a charming item, a square blue frame with a chocobo on the upper right hand corner, inside was a picture of the four of them. A family picture; Cloud's arm was on Tifa's shoulder, while Tifa was leaning to him. Cloud thought Tifa was as beautiful as ever in that picture, and he thought the two kids were charming as they were sitting on the beanbag with big grins plastered on their faces. It was Marlene's idea to get a picture and Denzel's to turn it into a keychain. That was time when they went together to the Gold Saucer, about a month before he left. Those were the few happy moments in his life, those moments with his family. The chocobo frame was chosen by the kids since the two said it reminded them of his hair. He smiled at that memory, those small sweet instances were the ones the enjoyed most. Marlene got a pink one, it had a monkey…which she honestly yet harshly said reminded her of her dad, Barret. Denzel got a green one with a sword, being Cloud's fan he wanted anything that had something to do with Cloud. Tifa's, Cloud couldn't forget what Tifa had, he chose it. It was a black frame, with silver shining gems and crystals carefully and expertly pasted on its sides. Of course it was more expensive than the others but as loving as Cloud was he insisted and the blushing Tifa couldn't resist his sincere azure eyes. His smile became larger as more memories started traveling through his head, but he shook his head and opened the door. He came for one purpose and if there's on thing he learned over the years it was keeping his eyes on the prize. He was never successful with Tifa on that one though.

He immediately inhaled smell of beer as he went in. He opened the lights and scanned the room. The wine glasses were neatly stacked up and clean in the cabinet he built months ago, the chairs were on top of the tables and the checkered black-and-white floor was neatly waxed. He slowly and carefully walked up the stairs. He tried his best to keep himself from opening the door of the children's room and checking up on them. Marlene and Denzel have always been light sleepers; he didn't want to risk it.

He made his way to Tifa's room and he slowly opened the door. The room was dark nothing but the moonlight shed brightness on the room. An angelic figure lay in the bed, silver streaks of light from the moon which peeked from the corner of the window illuminated Tifa's face. She was so beautiful and cute, for the young maiden was curled up like a kid. He smiled once more as he went nearer, but his genuine smile broke down as he noticed the trickles of tears down her cheek and the wet pillow. She had been crying. A pang of guilt ran through Cloud's soul, how could've he let such a precious person like Tifa cry. He wanted to stay there, to hold her, but he couldn't.

Cloud gently wiped the tears from Tifa's eyes and put a blanket over her. He tucked the loose hair strands behind her ear and stared at her sleeping figure.

Suddenly she grabbed his hand. He almost jumped as he felt Tifa's cold hand hold his tightly. She was calling his name, she kept repeating it, she looked vulnerable, fearful.

"Cloud, why can't you stay?" Tifa held him, tighter, and though she was sleeping she had a pretty good grip.

_Have you ever noticed that the worst way to miss someone  
is when they are right beside you and you can never have them?... that's why I can't stay Teef that's why…_

After Cloud said those words Tifa's grasp of him suddenly softened and she whispered "But promise you will come back"… Cloud found himself thinking whether she was sleeping or not, so he waved his hands in front of her face, but no response, she was definitely sleeping.

The sword master delicately removed his hands from hers and snatched a piece of paper which was on top of her night stand, then he wrote a note

_**You forgot to say goodnight to a certain person…**_

As soon as Cloud was done writing, he walked out, but strangely, after a few more seconds he came running back with a smirk on his face and then he kissed Tifa. Yes, those were one of the things you'd never expect from a Cloud Strife, but you can never tell, people do a lot of crazy things. And again no one new him that well, no one ever saw his dorky side.

A few moments after the kiss, Tifa felt more alert and heard the doors shut. She quickly stood up, looked around the dark room and saw the piece of paper on the table beside her bed she grabbed it, and there, she immediately knew…Cloud was here. She threw the brown sheets aside and hurriedly ran down, not caring how much noise she could've made.

"Cloud!" she called him while storming down the stairs, but when she finally reached the main door and opened it, all she could see was a disappearing figure.

_Who do I turn to when the only person  
who can stop me from crying is the one who is making me cry?...Cloud I need you_

Though she felt down from his sudden take off and unwarned visit, she continued to look on the bright side and felt a huge shot of happiness and a small touch of hope in her _strifed _heart.

She shook her head, smiled and opened the crumpled paper in her hand. The young maiden bit her lip and immediately ran to her room to text her dear _Lifehood crush…_

She was like a teenager in love, and so was Cloud

Cloud once again found himself staring at the glowing stars; he was tired, tonight's events were all confusing. He felt like his mako side took over, but no, he was just..inlove…

He felt the phone vibrate and he heard it ring, excitement filled his body, he opened it and a message was waiting to be opened.

_**Goodnight Cloud…**_

As soon as Cloud read the first line of the message he closed his phone, and contentedly drowsed off to sleep.Once again his dreams would be filled with Tifa Lockheart, his first love…his _koibito_ .He was contented with the goodnight from the girl he loved, too bad though, because he didn't get to scroll down, he didn't get to see one more thing so. One button could've revealed a very very fragile secret

_**Goodnight Cloud…**_

**_I love you_ **

Cloud Strife had always been dense and well…stupid when it comes to love…of all the messages he received, he never scrolled down

_Perhaps he would just look at all the messages again in another time, maybe tomorrow, but little did he know that tomorrow…_

_a group of silver haired men would show up, _

_a summon beast would unravel_

_his rival would once again meet him_

_Avalanche would be reunited_

_his life would once again be rambled_

_and chaos would emerge_

_But most importantly he didn't know that his cell phone would fall in the depths of the lake in Ajit…_

------------------

_Up in the Lifestream_

"Those two are suckers" A familiar voice said

"Shut up Zack" the girl in pink replied with a teasing smile on her face

"Come on why they can't take it carefree like me" the ex-Soldier said once again scratching the back of his head

"Zack, I'm actually praying that they don't end up like you, you ended up broke, your best friend turned nuts, your other friend's a hopeless romantic, your mom got drunk , you got shot and now you're about to get dumped by me for the second time if you don't stop"…

_Aaaaah...Love, such a powerful word, such a beautiful feeling, such an uplifting commitment…such a complex concept which could drive you to do miss the simplest things.…_

**SEQUEL?**

**Oh well, there it is R&R leave comments please, give criticism if you must!**

**PLUG:read My Cloud by Lockheart016! **

A/N: Hello guys, well I see that there are many requests for a sequel. So I posted this to tell you that I'll try and put it here as soon as I can, probably two weeks from now. I'm very sorry for not putting it sooner, but I'm really busy. Thanks for your patience. …and sorry again

Special thanks to the people who reviewed and added it to their favorite list! Love a guys, and I hope you'd still support me

-Ch0kNaT

…I'm very sorry because I wasn't thinking when I posted the author's note…I was very sleepy


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